Though he spent the most of his early career bouncing around from bit part to bit part, Kyle Chandler finally caught people’s attention for his starring turn as Coach Taylor in the small-screen adaptation of “Friday Night Lights.” Since the series ended, Chandler has worked with directors like J.J. Abrams, Ben Affleck, Kathryn Bigelow and Martin Scorsese, with another auteur now lined up.

EW is reporting that the “Friday Night Lights” star has landed the lead in the Ridley Scott-helmed Showtime pilot “The Vatican.” The hour-long drama, described as “a provocative contemporary genre thriller,” will center on Chandler as “the charismatic yet enigmatic Archbishop of New York, whose progressive leanings excite some and alarm others within the hierarchy of the Catholic Church.”

The rest of the cast is rounded out by “Stoker” star Matthew Goode “as the Pope’s closest confidante” and “The Lives of Others” — and one-half of the Russian villains of “A Good Day to Die Hard” — star Sebastian Koch as a politically ambitious cardinal infamous “for his proven abilities to ruthlessly wield power within the Church hierarchy.” With the Holy See in the news again thanks to the resignation of the Pope, the show that is already promising to go behind the scenes of one of the most powerful institutions in the world just a got a lot more fascinating.

With Scott still finishing up the Cormac McCarthy-scripted “The Counselor,” we’re guessing Showtime’s going to want the director to work on “The Vatican” next, and considering that it’s casting up, that looks to be the case. In the meantime, Coach Taylor fans will be able to find Chandler on the big screen in two more movies this year following the forgettable “Broken City“: Sundance darling “The Spectacular Now” and the latest Scorsese & Leonardo DiCaprio collaboration “The Wolf of Wall Street.”